Thanks USAID for the water!

A few months back I applied for a USAID SPA grant. SPA means Small Project Assistance and it's for projects related to climate change. Here in Vanuatu, it really makes sense to do water projects with it. I applied for roughly 10,000 USD in order to get 6 water tanks, and I got it!

[Thank yu USAID ... NBV gave me my money in a manila envelope. Those would be 5000 vatu notes right there. I don't know why Spider Man is there.]

So I run around Vila with my money in an envelope. Roughly 6500 at the tank place, 2500 at the ship's office, and the rest over at the hardware store. 

Everything goes on the ship, whereupon...

 So the approved way to get water tanks to shore is ... to throw them off the side of the ship.

Here are people trying to maneuver over to the shore. 

Push push push.

On top!

So now Tongariki has 21,300L of extra water tank space. Thanks USAID! This is going to make a nice difference -- the population exceeds the water storage space that we already have. Climate change is going to affect Pacific islands probably more than anywhere else on Earth. Luckily, Vanuatu is volcanic and it's not atolls, so, unlike with Tuvalu, there's no threat that we'll go under the water. But it's so hard to live out here and if there's not enough water during the dry season more and more frequently, this is going to make life even harder than it already is.